Mark Ballas & Alexander Jean Bandmate BC Jean Engaged! How He Proposed! (Exclusive)

The music is a little sweeter
these days for Mark Ballas. The “Dancing with the Stars” pro
exclusively confirms to Access Hollywood that he and his longtime
girlfriend and bandmate BC Jean are engaged!

The musician
and “Dancing” pro proposed to his singer/songwriter love BC (who wrote
Beyonce’s “If I Were A Boy”) late last year. Mark told Access
Hollywood exclusively that his romantic proposal took inspiration from one of
their Alexander Jean songs — “Roses and Violets.”

And he tells Access Hollywood exactly how  he planned it and what happened:

The day before
Thanksgiving, Mark lined the driveway of the couple’s Los Angeles home with
roses and violets. Inside, the home, which is currently undergoing
construction, was decorated in a Woodstock theme.

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“The day
before the proposal, I had
the house literally turned into Woodstock,” Mark told Access Hollywood on Thursday, revealing that their home was
outfitted in vintage rugs and “posters of all her favorite bands everywhere.”

Getting her to
the house for the proposal, though, required a little fib he was able to
concoct thanks to their home being under construction.

WATCH: ‘DWTS’ — Alexa PenaVega & Mark Ballas Talk Competition & Costumes 

“Our manager
for our group called and said, ‘Look,
there’s been a bit of a thing
at the house, you need to go confirm something. Mark can’t get over there.’
She said, ‘Yeah, no problem,'” Mark continued.

In honor of their
2015 song “Roses and Violets,” Mark said he lined their driveway with
petals from the two flowers.

“Violets are
out of season, so it took me forever to get ’em,” he laughed. “So, she got there, and then when she
came into the house
and she opened the door, it was as if she was transported to ’60s/’70s
Woodstock.”

Week after week,
Mark is known for putting his nerves aside to tackle the ballroom on ABC’s
“Dancing with the Stars,” but when BC walked inside the house, he felt nervous.

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“When she
got in there I froze. … My heart was pounding. I was cool as a cucumber all
day. I’ve been on stages my whole life, and when she walked in the room I thought, ‘Whoa, here we go.’ So
we kind of just held each
other for a minute, and then I did the [one-knee] drop, I popped the question, she said
yes,” he told Access exclusively. “Everything went to plan and the
way the house was decorated – it was just absolutely incredible.”

After she said
yes, there was another emotional moment in store for the couple – friends and
family were hiding upstairs to congratulate them and share in the happy day.

“After she
said yes, I said, ‘I have one
more surprise for you,’ and I yelled
out down the hallway then all of a sudden, she heard a load of
yells back and all our best friends [and] family — they
were all hiding upstairs in our bedroom and she had no idea,” Mark said.

The cousin who
was there on the night Mark met BC, her parents (and grandmother) and his folks were all present to celebrate. Mark noted a few loved ones were unable
to attend due to schedules, but the day couldn’t have been more memorable. 

“It was
absolutely perfect.” Mark said of the romantic proposal day.

The happy
twosome are thinking about
their wedding, but right now want to enjoy their engagement, and their upcoming
Alexander Jean dates, including performances at Sundance and SXSW. Their
single, “Roses and Violets,” has been a success for the two of them.
It went to No. 1 on the singer/songwriter chart and was used in “Duck
Dynasty,” and on “Dancing with the Stars,” to a routine
performed by Bindi Irwin (who won Season 21) and Derek Hough.

“We
were honored,” Mark said of “DWTS” using the Alexander Jean
song. “We were surprised. We didn’t ask them to use it, they just kind of
came up and said, ‘We’d love to use the song.’ We said, ‘Absolutely,’… and we
cleared the master for them so it was really BC’s voice, singing when they got
to dance to it and then after that showing, it hit No. 1 on singer/songwriter
[chart] and No. 6 on the pop chart and it charted in seven countries and it
went to No. 1 in Australia on the singer-songwriter chart too.

“And even
during the show, no one knew it was us… because it was just the master and it
wasn’t like we were talking about it and then slowly, people started to figure
out that, ‘Oh wow, this is BC Jean’s voice and this is Mark and
they’re a duo now,’ and it started to come out, so it was cooler,” Mark
continued. “The song did well
because the song is good, not because of anything else other than that and then, when they found out who the song was by, it was just a bonus, you
know what I mean? That was kind of the plan from the get-go. We didn’t want to
lean on or crutch off of anything else we’ve done in the past. We want the
music to be about the music.”

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The newly-engaged
pair plan to release an Alexander Jean EP on March 11, and it will include
“Roses and Violets” as well as four additional original recordings,
including the very first cut the two penned together – “Head High.”

“One night I
said to her, ‘You know, we’ve never written a song –  why don’t
we, tonight, let’s get a bottle of wine, we get some food, and light some
candles, get a notebook and a pencil, no computers, no Pro Tools, no auto tune,
no interfaces, no nothing, let’s just do it the old school way, let’s write a
song for fun,'” Mark said.

That evening, the
pair spent three or four hours working together, resulting in that tune, which they both
decided needed to be recorded.

The following
week, they recorded it and realized they’d found a little magic.

“When we
listened back to it, inside, I’m thinking, ‘This sounds awesome,’ and I’m looking at her like, ‘Is it awesome, or am I tripping?’ And she
looked at me, she’s says, ‘This is great.’ And I  told her, ‘We’ve got something
here. Maybe the reason we haven’t done all the stuff we wanted to do
music-wise is because we’re meant to be doing this together.'”

— Jolie Lash